Taoism and Contemporary Issues

By Chong Sun Kim

Taoism and Contemporary Issues, compiled by Professor Chong Sun Kim, presents a thought-provoking anthology addressing the pressing challenges of modern society. This collection bridges the wisdom of traditional Taoist texts with contemporary insights, featuring voices from influential figures like E.F. Schumacher and Noam Chomsky. Through essay

• Language: English
• Publisher: Palmetto Publishing
• Release date: Nov 5, 2024
• ISBN: 9798822955066

Chong Sun Kim

Chong Sun Kim, Ph.D., is a distinguished Professor Emeritus dedicated for his expertise in East Asian History and Culture, notably specializing in ancient Korea. With a doctoral degree from the University of Washington, Seattle, awarded in 1965, Kim has dedicated decades to scholarly pursuits and academic leadership at the University of Rhode Island. Throughout his illustrious career, Dr. Kim has authored many highly acclaimed essays and books, delving deep into the intricacies of ancient Korean history. His scholarly contributions have not only enriched academic discourse but have also garnered significant recognition within the field. Beyond his scholarly endeavors, Dr. Kim maintains an interest in contemporary socio-political issues, lending his expertise to analyze and understand the evolving political landscape of modern Korea. His insightful perspectives serve as a valuable resource for students, researchers, and policymakers alike.Among his notable publications are "Rev. Sun Myung Moon" (University Press of America, Lanham∙New York∙London, 1978) and "The Gold-Crowned Jesus and Other Writings, Kim Chi Ha" (Orbis Books, Maryknoll, New York, 1978), which stand as exemplary works in the study of contemporary Korean political culture. Dr. Kim's dedication to scholarship and his impact on the academic community continue to inspire and resonate, leaving a noteworthy mark on the study of East Asian history and culture.

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Copyright © 2024 by Chong Sun Kim

All rights reserved

No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any means–electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or other–except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without prior permission of the author.

Hardcover ISBN: 979-8-8229-5504-2

Paperback ISBN: 979-8-8229-5505-9

eBook ISBN: 979-8-8229-5506-6

Acknowledgments

This book is a testament to the principle that shared knowledge and collaboration are often the cornerstones of achieving greatness. It is a principle that has been brought to life in this compilation, which, while containing select excerpts, leans heavily on a wide range of contemporary works by distinguished scholars for a comprehensive exploration of the theme, Taoism and modern human alienation.

I owe a debt of gratitude to David Lesher and Richard Keogh, my former teaching assistants, whose invaluable contributions greatly assisted in the organization and interpretation of the cited texts. I extend a special note of appreciation to Lesher, who co-authored Taoism and Contemporary Music, a work featured in this compilation.

Teresa Fernandez’s expert editing significantly improved the clarity of my essays and commentary, and I am deeply grateful for her contribution. I also wish to acknowledge the publishers who kindly granted permission for the use of excerpts in Taoism and Contemporary Issues.

The cover features a poignant wood engraving of Lao Tzu astride a water buffalo, a piece by Fritz Eichenberg, a neighbor from my time at the University of Rhode Island. Although he passed away during the book’s compilation, his work continues to resonate with me. My daughter, Lucia Kim, a talented graphic artist, enriched the cover with her scenic backdrop, while my son, Willis Kim, a skilled engineer and technologist, provided invaluable and tireless technical and logistical support.

This book would not have been possible without the unwavering support of my family, including my other son, Junius Kim, and my wife, Duksoon Kim. Their enduring bond and support are reflected in this work, serving as a reminder of the broader global community we are all a part of.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION, by Chong Sum Kim

PART I: THE WAY OF LAO TZU

1LAO TZU, by William Packard

2From: THE WAY OF CHUANG TZU, by Thomas Merton

3From: TAOISM: THE PARTING OF THE WAY, by Holmes Welch

4From: PRINCIPLES OF CHINESE PAINTING, by George Rowley

PART II: SEPARATION FROM TAO AND CONTEMPORARY PROBLEMS

5From: THE MYTH OF THE MACHINE: THE PENTAGON OF POWER, by Lewis Mumford

6From: FUTURE SHOCK, by Alvin Toffler

7From: THE SANE SOCIETY, by Erich Fromm

8From: TAOISM: THE PARTING OF THE WAY, by Holmes Welch

PART III: TOWARD TAO

9From: SIDDHARTH, by Herman Hesse

10From: THE GREENING OF AMERICA, by Charles A. Reich

11From: ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE, by Robert M. Pirsig

12From: THE TAO OF PHYSICS, by Fritjof Capra

13From: THE ONLY DANCE THERE IS, by Ram Dass

14From: SMALL IS BEAUTIFUL: ECONOMICS AS IF PEOPLE MATTERED, by E. F. Schumacher

15TAOISM AND CONTEMPORARY MUSIC, by David Lesher and Chong Sun Kim

PART IV: ADDENDUM

16From: EARTH IN MIND, by David W. Orr

17From: NUCLEAR WAR AND ENVIRONMENTAL CATASTROPHE, by Noam Chomsky and Laray Polk

18ALIENATION AND THE TAO, by Chong Sun Kim

Introduction

We live in a very troubled society. The evidence is all around us. Violence and wars are a daily occurrence. Crime of all types is rampant. Drug and alcohol abuse continue to be serious social issues. Environmental destruction has been catastrophic, and now global warming is producing wildfires, extreme droughts, and rainfall disrupting food production in certain regions. Greenland’s ice sheet is in the process of disappearing. Earth is under more stress and a process of extinction than we realize. Pornography feeds on children and some 300,000 children are at risk of commercial sexual exploitation in the United States alone. Job dissatisfaction is widespread. Psychological disorders and mental breakdowns affect more people than physical ailments. Alienation, loneliness, and feelings of utter helplessness are extremely common. The list can easily be continued.

These problems, which feed on to each other, are becoming more sinister and conspicuous in the 20th century (and 21st) despite a general growth in democracy, freedom, and human rights, which have neither effectively dealt with, nor even substantially reduced, the problems of violence against men and nature in the modern world. Apparently, the analyses and remedies that have been employed by philosophers and social scientists have been largely inadequate. We would like to offer modern society a different approach to its problems. We believe that a radical change is possible by integrating into society the wisdom of the ancient Chinese Taoist epistemology. By listening to the teachings of Lao Tzu, the founder of Taoism, and Chaung Tzu, its historical spokesman, human regeneration may be possible.

Our look at Taoism in the twentieth century will be divided into three main parts. Part I is designed to acquaint the reader with Taoism. The essays that make up this section should be especially helpful for those who generally are not attuned to Lao Tzu’s Tao Te Ching, a 5000-word poetic text on the Way and Virtue. Hopefully, after reading these essays, the reader will understand the concepts and ideas that are Taoism, and, as important, a feeling for the subtleties of the Tao or the Way. Part II focuses upon contemporary society, revealing some of the fundamental problems of man today. The commentators give us an illuminating picture of a mega-technological world controlled by machines, a society unwilling to come to grips with soulless plastic transformation, loss of feeling, and of a massive psychological breakdown. Part III is a synthesis, a kind of living Taoism. Hopefully, this part will demonstrate that Taoism is not merely Eastern exoticism, but rather having something to offer modern society what it needs.

Taoism and Contemporary Issues is an effort to make Lao Tzu’s concept of man and nature relevant to problems facing modern men and women, a sort of living Taoism in a way that people can come to grips with his all-embracing wisdom of Tao. In fact, harmony between humans and nature was not only Lao Tzu’s exclusive idea of cosmic flow but was also a deep-seeded concept in Henry David Thoreau’s Walden Pond. Thus, I have avoided interpretations of Lao Tzu’s thought strictly in the context of a limited time and space in the Chinese classical period. My aim was rather to provide readers with an opportunity to examine Tao in its universal context, showing it is not an outdated ancient Chinese mystical philosophy, but a way of seeing ourselves and the world. This book is intended to show how our loss of Tao led to a cosmic imbalance between man and nature, the fundamental cause of ecological disaster and the breakdown of Taoist simplicity, understanding and inner consciousness. Perhaps more than any other time in history, the muscular aggressive yang force has effectively outvalued the inner yin sensitivities for deeper living, thereby destroying the cosmic balance which Lao Tzu called Tao or the Way.

Natural flow is the motif of Taoist landscape paintings, greatly influenced by Lao Tzu’s ideas of wu wei (non-action), where mountains, stones, rivers, people, and plants are all equal, and everything obeys seasons and flows in harmony with nature. Human figures are usually very small, only a tiny part of nature with which they flow together. There is a similar tradition in Japan, where all divine creations (both animate and inanimate) such as insects, rivers, stones, people, water, etc., whose nomenclature are always prefixed with the letter o (sacred), such as omushi (sacred insects), okawa (sacred river), oishi (sacred rock), ohito (sacred human). There was a culture called p’ungryu (literally meaning ‘wind flow’ in ancient Korea, where it was believed that training of mind and body would be realized only in the environment of flowing scenic rivers and mountains, which promote meditation and higher spiritual awareness. Ironically, in modern times, these countries, which had so much respect for nature, in the process of blindly copying Western industrial modernization, wreak havoc on their own mother nature. The public openly questioned how a country with such respect for nature had so ended up in the midst of such an environmental catastrophe. The effect of Japan’s first environmental disaster caused Minamata disease, which caused crippling human body and face deformation, and was recorded in the 1950s, when people ate fish that had been contaminated by large quantities of mercury compounds that were discharged into Minamata Bay by a chemical factory. At that time, more than 65,000 people sued for compensational disfigurement and over five decades later, the effects of this disaster are still being felt [1]. We praised Japan for its industrial might and progress, but they not only polluted their own rivers and ocean, and, in the past, engaged in devastation of rain forest areas for lumbering, strip mining and for digging up other resources in Southeast Asia. The industrial hub of Jang Tae in Hebei Province, home to 7 million people, is China’s most polluted city on earth. Toxic smoke pours into the air day and night, year in and year out, and coal is a huge part of this problem. Those who are living there are trapped between a sad choice of pollution and unemployment. The fossil fuel accounts for 70% of all energy consumed in China. Beijing, the capital of China, is one of the 16 most congested and polluted cities in the world. Linfen, Shanxi Province, has the largest coal industry in China and, environmentally, the most worthless and pitiful city on earth. There are no clouds, just a permanent toxic smog. All in all, 70% of Chinese cities cannot meet their air quality standards. One-third of the lakes in China are polluted, over 80% or 90% of the urban ground water are polluted, and factories release pollutants without cleaning up their mess. In the countryside, pesticides are used in agriculture to increase food production, but it has also increased the number of cancer patients [2]. In the process of learning about Western civilization and technology, the East has completely forgotten or ignored Lao Tzu’s thought, but now, faced with ecological crisis and with the emergence of green parties in the West, it is a truly ironic phenomenon that the East is stimulated by them.

Mother Nature is an interconnected chain of life and, by destroying this chain, we became alienated, not only from nature, but also from our fellow human beings, resulting in loneliness, mental and community breakdowns, machine- and computer-driven forced entertainment, as well as the proliferation of sex and violence on television day and night carrying guns into schools, victims of alienation-related crimes and social malaises. The numerous forms of violence that are rapidly increasing at home and abroad, closely linked to the arms race toward the danger of nuclear annihilation, go hand in hand with the destruction of Mother Earth. These are indeed ominous manifestations of modern pathological disorders. Sooner or later, we will be among the most endangered species. It is time to rebel for the sake of life if civilization and human beings are to survive.

Initially, I compiled this book in an unpublished form to use as supplementary reading in a Chinese History class I taught between 1978 and 1998 at the University of Rhode Island. Looking back, I feel it is more relevant today than it was 40 years ago when I compiled this book. And now, I decided to reproduce it with two additional articles, one by Noam Chomsky, Environmental and Nuclear Catastrophes, and the other by David W. Orr, The Dangers of Education. Since the compilation of this book 40 years ago, the end of the Vietnam War did not bring about the end of violence and wars in the world. Before the Vietnam War, the so-called civilized men killed three million men, women, and children during the last five decades including 300,000 radiation deaths by atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. After the Vietnam War, 1 million people have perished in the post-9/11 wars. U.S. allies in Afghanistan and Iraq spent an estimated $145 billion in military and non-military aid and 47 countries had troops deployed in Afghanistan. Mass destruction and killing are now going on in the Ukraine-Russian War and the Israeli-Hamas War. In the Ukraine-Russian War, Russia has openly threatened nuclear war with the United States, which provided weapons to Ukraine so that it can defend itself against Russian aggression. Even if the Ukraine-Russian War stops, there is a real possibility of another crisis and crazy nuclear blackmail elsewhere to be reckoned with. Meanwhile, global heating causes the sea level to rise at an alarming rate. We have witnessed the formation of lakes on Greenland’s ice sheet, which are speeding up its demise. Global warming precipitates forest fires, stronger hurricanes and flooding, migration of population from lower levels to higher levels, loss of land, and now scientists are forecasting a timeline of mass extinction on earth.

We are at the crossroads of the end of our organized human civilization from a two-fold threat from ecological disaster and nuclear exchange and warfare. It is urgent that we start a cultural revolution, the kind that was brought about by the young generation of America in the 1970’s at Woodstock Music and Art Fair, commonly referred to as Woodstock. It was a music festival held during August 15–18, 1969, on Max Yasgur’s dairy farm in Bethel, New York, for social change through peaceful means. Although there were certain problems in the movement, we need more than ever a renewed cultural and artistic movement combined with an environmental activism as the one spearheaded by Greta Thunberg, allied with communal political consciousness, if we want to overcome our insanity. The United States could build a strong Green Party and create a social democracy, with activist politicians like Bernie Sanders, in a common front with the Greens.

Freedom is clearly a valuable contribution of Western civilization in the sense of liberation from poverty, dictatorship, and oppression. However, its ego-obsessed human-centered civilization with a technology that has corrupted man to think that nature exists only for human comfort and exploitation, has given way to an imperialist competition for seizing resources and the resulting ecological destruction. The United States has had a great tradition of self-help, which poor countries need to emulate to escape from hunger. On the other hand, America’s ‘superman’ is a creation of its capitalist civilization. He emerges with a super ego who not only tames hostile nature with bulldozers, but also would reign in the world to catch socialists/communists and deliver them to the authority of a corporate law and order. We must reject and liberate ourselves from this ‘superman’ mentality. The lack of respect for the earth is not entirely a phenomenon of capitalist society. Marx’s philosophy, which had its root in the 18th Century Enlightenment idea, perceived the concept of infinite human progression from the lower agrarian mode of production to the higher mode of capitalist industrial production, to a utopian classless society through the conquest of nature. He only saw problems of unjust distribution of wealth in the capitalist system, however, never addressing the ecological consequences and depletion. Like the capitalist mode of production, Soviet Bloc communism also inflicted lasting environmental damage, i.e., carbon dioxide, acid rain, industrial mining and oil sludge, polluted rivers, deforestation in Siberia, soil poisoning (Chernobyl).

To show the seriousness of humanity’s problem as a result of nature’s destruction, this book introduces various topics on the problems faced by contemporary men and women, and their alienation. Of course, neither can we return to an era in which the environment was virginally sound, nor is it possible to build the kind of society Lao Tzu envisioned. Nevertheless, through sustainable development, we are still able to maintain certain measures of cosmic balance and flow. To do so, we need an educational reform that befriends and cooperates with ecology, and we must stop any further harm to our relationship with the beauty of mountains, oceans, rivers, streams, and with fellow members of the human community. To this end, the history curriculum must move away from a man-centered history, to focus on the history of the relationship between man and nature along with democratic education. It calls for a mandatory requirement of a liberal arts subject for a university bachelor’s degree program. The United States is the most powerful country on earth and, for any environmental movement to be effective worldwide, it must start in the United States. Thus, this book is centered mostly on humanistic problems and issues emanating from this area of the world.

Chong Sun Kim, January 6, 2024, Canton, Massachusetts.

[1]On the Minamata disaster, see YouTube.

[2]On pollution in China, see The Devastating Effects of Pollution in China, YouTube.

PART I

THE WAY OF LAO TZU

1

Perhaps the most serious difficulty to overcome in initiating a discussion of Taoism is the issue of cultural shock. Eastern knowledge often seems exotic and alien ground for many Westerners, which might scare them away. The underlying continuities then become obscured behind artificially created barriers, rigid ideologies, and strict dogma. Much that could be helpful is thereby lost.

William Packard, a New York poet, has gone far in dispelling the cultural shock that might accompany the introduction of Taoism into Western society. He ingeniously creates a universal experience of Taoism by relating it to Western literary and religious thoughts and traditions without losing the essence and subtlety of the Tao. Packard illuminates the wisdom of Tao or the Way with the help of such familiar figures as Jesus Christ, William Shakespeare, Walt Whitman, and Ezra Pound. His 1976 New York Quarterly article, which appears in this compilation, provides us with the comfortable surroundings necessary to begin our contemplation of Taoism and contemporary society. Packard is a master synthesizer who has gone far in helping those not familiar with Eastern philosophy to be more congenial to an understanding of it.

LAO TZU

William Packard (Lao Tzu, New York Quarterly, No. 18, Spring 1976, pp. 3-11)

THE COVER OF THIS NYQ ISSUE #18 IS A WOOD ENGRAVING OF CHINESE PHILOSOPHER LAO TZU, MADE BY FRITZ EICHENBERG. EICHENBERG’S PRINT DEPICTS LAO TZU ON A WATER BUFFALO, PASSING THROUGH THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA, ON HIS WAY AWAY FROM ALL KNOWN CIVILIZATION AND OUT INTO THE WILDERNESS BEYOND. IT IS AT THE END OF LAO TZU’S LIFE, AND IT IS HIS FINAL LEAVING BEHIND. IT IS THE WISDOM OF THE WAY FOR LAO TZU. IT IS THE TAO.

Who was this Lao Tzu, this teacher of the wisdom of the Way?

His name was Lao Tzu, or Lao-Tse, which means the old master. He is thought to have lived from 6O4-531 B.C., born in K’unsien. If these dates are correct, it would place Lao Tzu in the following approximate chronology with these other great figures:

604-531 B.C. - Lao Tzu

563-413 B.C. - Gautama Buddha

551-479 B.C. - Confucius

536-470 B.C. - Herakleitos

525-456 B.C. - Aeschylus

There are numerous apocryphal accounts of the life of Lao Tzu. Confucius is reported to have visited Lao Tzu, and to have said of him afterward:

This day I have seen Lao Tzu and he is a dragon.

Lao Tzu’s mysticism was a sort of informed quietism, with a deep distrust of all action and ritual ceremony. Lao Tzu did not even want to write down any of his lessons; he knew how mischievous the written word could be, in the hands of later scholars and editors and disciples.

But his disciples did persuade Lao Tzu to write down his teachings, and the result is the Tao Te Ching, which is a 5000-word text, composed of some 81 sayings.

The basic lesson of the Tao Te Ching is that one must learn one’s own nature, which is also the nature of the real world, and that one must follow this nature always.

Lao Tzu wrote his sayings in the form of short verses. Following are some excerpts from the Tao Te Ching:

1. The Tao that can be told of

is not the Absolute Tao;

and the names that can be given

are not the absolute names.

The Tao cannot be named; in other words, one must try to live one’s life in the name of what cannot be named. There are no names or images for the Tao, for the Wisdom of the Way. Even though our instinct is to set up languages and idols to help us attain our wisdom, we must resist any such objectification.

Exodus 20 reminds us of the very same thing:

Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth… Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them; for I thy LORD the God am a jealous God…

Lao Tzu insisted that the truth of life lay not in a name or in an image, but in the wisdom of the Way. Jesus may be saying something very similar, in John 14:6:

I am the way, the truth and the life.

9. Retire when your work is done,

such is heaven’s way.

The most difficult thing in this world is to develop a sense of sublime timing; to quit at quitting time.

There is an old joke that it takes two people to paint a painting; one person to paint the painting, and the other person to hit the first person over the head when the painting is finished, so the first person won’t go on and ruin the painting.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-9 stresses the importance of a sense of sublime timing:

To everything there is a season, and a time to every

purpose under the heaven:

A time to be born, and a time to die;

a time to plant, and a time to pluck up

that which is planted;

A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to

break down, and a time to build up;

A time to weep, and a time to laugh, a time to

mourn, and a time to dance;

A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather

stones together; a time to embrace, and a time

to refrain from embracing;

A time to get, and a time to lose; a time to

keep silence, and a time to speak;

A time to love, and a time to hate; a time of

war, and a time of peace.

16. To return to the root is Repose;

it is called going back to one’s Destiny.

Always, there is the call to go back, to go back to the source, back to the selfhood, back to one’s own origin. The call is to go home to who you are and stay that way.

33. He who knows others is learned;

He who knows himself is wise.

He who conquers others has power of muscles;

He who conquers himself is strong.

There are many antecedents in Western literature for these thoughts, beginning with the Delphic Oracle’s Know thyself.

Chaucer says much the same thing in the Balade de Bon Conseyl, where he writes:

Work well thy-self, that other folk canst rede;

And trouthe shal delivere, hit is no drede.

And Ezra Pound, in our own time, wrote in Canto LXXXI:

Master thyself, then others shall thee beare

Pull down thy vanity

Thou art a beaten dog beneath the hail,

A swollen magpie in a fitful sun,

Half black half white

Nor knowst’ou wing from tail

Pull down thy vanity

How mean thy hates

Fostered in falsity,

Pull down thy vanity,

Rathe to destroy, niggard in charity,

Pull down thy vanity,

I say pull down.

45. Who is calm and quiet becomes

the guide for the universe.

The Quakers have always believed in the guidance of the inner light, the still small voice within which may seem so tentative and insignificant unless one is listening for it. This inner light which is the wisdom of the Way is in reality the moving force of the entire universe.

46. There is no curse like the lack of contentment.

No greater sin than the desire for possession.

He who is contented with contentment

Shall always be content.

To be contented with contentment that is the wisdom of the Way.

Pascal observes in the Pensees (139):

I have discovered that all the unhappiness of men arises

from one single fact, that they cannot stay quietly

in their own chamber.

48. By doing nothing everything is done.

He who conquers the world often

does so by doing nothing.

The unimportance of action that is the wisdom of the Way.

Shakespeare writes in Sonnet LXV:

How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,

Whose action is no stronger than a flower?

In Tolstoy’s War and Peace, the Russian general Kutuzov believes in the unimportance of action, as a key military strategy:

Always in haste, and more haste, worse speed. Kamensky would have come to grief there, if he hadn’t died. He went storming fortresses with thirty thousand men. It’s easy enough to take fortresses, but it’s hard to finish off a campaign successfully. Storms and attacks are not what’s wanted, but time and patience. Kamensky sent his soldiers to attack Rustchuk, but I trusted to them alone—time and patience—and I took more fortresses than Kamensky, and made the Turks eat horseflesh!

Christopher Fry, in A Sleep of Prisoners, writes of the unimportance of action; in a dream of Shadrac, Meshak and Abednego in the blazing fires, a character says:

So help me, in

The stresses of this furnace I can see

To be strong beyond all action is the strength

To have.

53. The Main Path is easy to walk on,

yet people love the small by-paths.

The main way, and the wisdom of the Way, is so free and easy, it is so easy.

Walt Whitman says so, in his Song of the Open Road:

Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road.

Healthy, free, the world before me,

The long brown path before me leading wherever I choose.

Henceforth I ask not good-fortune,

I myself am good-fortune,

Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need

nothing,

Done with indoor complaints, libraries, querulous criticisms,

Strong and content I travel the open road.

56. He who knows does not speak;

He who speaks does not know.

Sometimes this seems to be one of the worst features of living in America—all the talk talk talk talk talk—everyone running around, so busy being verbal about the invisible.

One is reminded of Von Hugel’s gentle warning, in his letters to a niece:

Be silent about great things; let them grow inside you. Never discuss them: discussion is so limiting and distracting. It makes things grow smaller. You think you swallow things when they ought to swallow you. Before all greatness, be silent—in art, in music, in religion: silence.

64. A journey of a thousand li begins at one’s feet.

No matter how long the journey, no matter how vast the project, it must always begin with a first step. This is the wisdom of the Way.

Robert Louis Stevenson writes in Aes Triplex:

By all means begin your folio: even if the doctor does not give you a year, even if he hesitates about a month, make one brave push and see what can be accomplished in a week. It is not only in finished undertakings that we ought to honour useful labour. A spirit goes out of the man who means execution, which outlines the most untimely ending. All who have meant good work with their whole hearts, have done good work, although they may die before they have the time to sign it.

What does all this wisdom of the Way have to do with poets, and with poetry?

It has nothing to do with poetry, and yet it has everything to do with poetry.

The muse, like the Tao, cannot be toyed with or talked about. One is either wholly committed to poetry, and to the wisdom of the Way, or one is not.

And the Way is clear, always—although the Way is utterly beyond the reach of reason and must